lsquo;Of course thatrsquo;s how it begins: a harmless fairy tale to pass the hoursrsquo;When Alice Liddell Hargreaves met Peter Llewelyn Davies at the opening of a Lewis Carroll exhibition in 1932; the original Alice in Wonderland came face to face with the original Peter Pan. In John Loganrsquo;s remarkable new play; enchantment and reality collide as this brief encounter lays bare the lives of these two extraordinary characters.
#1395977 in eBooks 2013-02-12 2013-02-12File Name: B00BUKIR4U
Review
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful. Excellent study of Britains capital cityBy William PodmoreLivingstones 2000 report; The State of London; said; "the prosperity of every Londoner is completely tied up with the citys role in the international economy." But most London workers produce goods or provide services that are used locally: only 19% of Londons turnover is exported. The authors conclude; "the global and European roles together are still clearly much less significant for London than its continuing role as a national centre."London was Britains largest single manufacturing centre; but since 1962 it has lost 1.6 million manufacturing jobs. Its unemployment has worsened recently.The authors attack Blairs approach to local government: "Within each local authority the proliferation of government ordained partnerships and specially focused programmes (by service; group and/or locality) is making a coordinated approach and `joined up governance harder than ever. ... our work has tended both to cast doubts on the efficacy of local programmes; and to underline the importance of a number of mainstream policy areas. ... Labours pursuit of `joined-up action seems quite perversely to have brought ever more complex arrays of `initiatives which are short-term; unsustainable; uncoordinated and even contradictory. ... area-based approaches ... have been the staple of urban policy for the past 35 years; but rarely matched their promises with sustainable achievements. ... We are sceptical; however; about what has been achieved through the proliferation of health; education and other action zones."Southwark; for example; has contracted out education and housing benefit administration; reducing its ability to coordinate policies. The council relies on private investment for regeneration; but most residents have not gained from the spectacular new South Bank. This kind of `regeneration is just like the old discredited `trickle-down.The authors propose national programmes for "improving the supply of low- and moderate-income housing - and conditions in the existing stock of social housing - in ways that prevent this stock from being subsequently `captured by other groups; improving public transport provision while restricting the costs of such travel; so as to enhance particularly the mobility of disadvantaged groups; and raising performance in those state schools at the bottom of current league tables ..."